story identification - What old movie had people living in a simulated world of bar-coded cardboard props?

It had a matrix like plot -- the protagonist starts to get glimpses of a dark, drab world underneath what appears to be a perfect existence. The defining moment is when

he is chased by armed cops and he looks back to see the reality: a bunch of pajama clad people pointing L-shaped wooden pieces at him. He smiles and keep running. None of the make believe bullets hit him.

He goes onto find that the world consists mostly of cardboard and wooden props with barcodes identifying what they're supposed to be. A signal tells peoples' brains what they should see. A name like "Arora" is mentioned but I cannot exactly recall.

Answer

I don't know if it's old enough, but your summary sounds like Virtual Nightmare (from 2000.)

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